Centennial

Today's entry is dedicated to my father, who would have been 100 years old this week. He was a medical professional, a dentist, and he loved me a lot. But it was love with topspin: Between his many terms of endearment, he periodically would assert that I could do better, that I didn't apply myself, and that, therefore, I might not amount to anything. Then I became an English major in college, and he knew it. When he died at 72 I was an encyclopedia editor, not exactly following in his footsteps.

Today, I am still an encyclopedia editor. In the Age of Wikipedia you don't need an actuary to explain why that's living dangerously. My father would turn in his grave except I already caused him to do that years ago. But I've got some good news for you, Dad; a 100th birthday present, if you will. I've finally amounted to something: I'm on the ALDAcon Sponsorship Committee!

And indeed I am. Lois broke me in very gently, as if she expected me to snap any minute. She discreetly rolled out the list of sponsors from last year's ALDAcon and explained the dollar level at which they had sponsored. It was a pretty impressive list: Sprint, Advanced Bionics, Motorola, Verizon, Ultratec, T-Mobile, AT&T, Cochlear--corporations that would put a smile on the face of any sponsorship chair. Lois was on the committee last year with the indomitable Cheryl Heppner, and they obviously had done a fabulous job. Well, I stood ready to hold the ladder: Go get em, Lois! Show them my name! Let me know when you're done and we'll drink to the memory of Jerry Barnhart.

But no, as I said in an earlier post, I couldn't let her take the blame if my name on the solicitation materials sunk a deal. I really couldn't. So I volunteered to handle some companies on my own. I reviewed the list again, looking for places that I'd feel more or less comfortable approaching. Maybe some sold cheeseburgers, for instance. But alas, most of them were technology companies. So I picked a few that might remember me from the early days of ALDA. My dad would have said that's exactly the wrong strategy, but I had a sudden rush of buoyancy and yes-I-can-ness. Because a couple of organizations on the list were run by people who way back when had come out of nowhere and made me feel blessed to be alive. And those are the people I decided to approach first: CART reporters.